


Dave and Karkat Go To Walmart

by professionalmomfriend (mothmanwashere)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Human AU, Humanstuck, M/M, Walmart, davekat - Freeform, domestic davekat, late night walmart trip, previously established relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-08
Updated: 2015-04-08
Packaged: 2018-03-21 22:17:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3706133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mothmanwashere/pseuds/professionalmomfriend
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just what it says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dave and Karkat Go To Walmart

**Author's Note:**

> I spent Easter cashiering at Walmart. You can piece together the rest.

“Karkaaaat, we don’t have any food.”

What the whiney call your boyfriend emits from the kitchen pantry means is that there are no Doritos in the apartment. However, what you hear is a reminder that you haven’t gone grocery shopping in about three weeks. The list you’ve slowly been adding to all week calls to you from where you know it waits, held to the refrigerator by only a fruit-shaped magnet. You begrudgingly tear your eyes away from Adam Sandler’s umpteenth attempt to woo Drew Barrymore after her brain’s nightly reset and turn off the television. 

“Let’s go, then.”

“Go where?” Dave inquires, pulling his head out of the pantry to look at you.

“Shopping,” you reply, already digging for your other shoe from where it got kicked beneath the tv stand. “I haven’t had time to go yet this week.”

“I can go tomorrow afternoon while you’re at work,” Dave points out. You scoff. He feigns hurt. “Karkat, I am a sophisticated adult man. Just last week, I purchased a vegetable.”

“Dave, a single grapefruit constitutes neither healthy eating nor a vegetable purchase. Grapefruit is fruit. Grape. FRUIT.”

“Goddamn, I had no idea. Does the universe always reveal its secrets to us in this fashion?”

“Shut up, you uneducated goose phallus. We’re going shopping.”

“It’s almost eleven. Are stores even open at this time of night?”

“Dave, please.”

~~~

Twenty minutes later, you and Dave stroll into Walmart. As you snag a cart, Dave stops to survey the hours posted on the automatic door. “They’re always open,” he whispers softly, to which you reply by rolling your eyes and going inside.

Walmart is quiet, almost abandoned if not for the night-shift employees who pay no attention to you beyond a polite nod and aversion from prolonged eye contact. Glancing down at your rather unorganized list, you turn your cart and head for the general merchandise end of the store. Best to save consumables for last. Mama Porrim didn’t raise no fool. “You need shampoo, right, Dave?” you ask, already adding a few more items to the list that came to your mind on the way here.

“Yeah.” Dave darts ahead of you and disappears down an aisle. You follow at a more leisurely pace, dropping a bottle of Flintstone’s vitamins and Advil into the cart. You’re lingering by the shaving cream when Dave returns and drops a bottle of children’s shampoo into the cart.

“Dave, what the fuck.”

“It smells like apples.”

“That is children’s shampoo.”

“This shampoo is the bomb, Karkat. Smell this shit.” Dave snaps open the top of the bottle and sticks it in your face, covering the tip of your nose in sticky gel. It’s overwhelmingly scented like artificial apples, and you know exactly why Dave gravitated toward it.

“Fitting.”

Dave grins at you, stupidly handsome, even at eleven pm in aisle 27 of Walmart, and you wipe the shampoo off your nose with your sleeve. “What’s next?”

“Uhh.” You refer to your list and cross out a few things. You stick two cans of Barbasol into your cart and cross off another item. “Bar soap. Behind you.”

Dave spins on his heel and surveys the neatly stacked rows of soap before plucking a six-pack of soap off the shelf and dropping it into the cart. “Done. What next?”

You’re already headed for the next item on your list, and let Dave follow you of his own accord. You scan the shelves of condoms and pick up a box just as Dave rounds the corner. “Babe, you got the Trojans? Oh, that’s so hot.” Suddenly he spins you toward him, cups your face between his hands, and kisses you hard. Your knees go a little weak before you can deny it, and you let him kiss you right there in the condom aisle for a few seconds before you come to your senses and bop him on the head with the box.  
“You’re being ridiculous, Dave,” you growl, a little too flushed to feel at all threatening. He laughs at you and grabs three more boxes from the shelf. “Jesus Christ, how many condoms do you need?”

Dave waggles his eyebrows at you. “All of the condoms, Karkat. All of them.”

“We can get one box, and that’s fucking it. Unless you’re planning to cover John’s car in them, in which case you will also need duct tape.”

“Good idea, but I’ll save that for his bachelor party,” Dave says, and puts the condoms back on the shelf before disappearing off into the next aisle. You’re not sure what he’s doing over that way, since any further aisles lead to the cosmetic department, but you decide he’s old enough to figure that out on his own. You cross condoms off your list and head toward housewares because Feferi’s birthday is next week and you are not forgetting to buy her a present again.

Dave catches up with you near the candles and drops several colors of nail polish into the cart. You pause, a candle in each hand. “Why?”

Dave shrugs. “Promised the girls I’d bring the nail polish to their slumber party.”

“Again… why?”

“It’s girl stuff, Karkat,” Dave sniffs. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“Whatever, asstown. Smell these two candles and tell me which one Feferi would like better.”

Dave obeys and twists his mouth thoughtfully. “The orange and pink one. It smells all tropical-ly.”

You place the Tropical Orchid candle into your cart and start to head away from housewares. The cart bumps into Dave’s hip (he’s taking a selfie on his phone, the dork), and when he doesn’t move, you begin bumping it repeatedly against him. “Move, you absolute cactus.”

“Ooh, I saw a cactus over there when I was getting the nail polish,” Dave says, looking up from his phone. “Can we get a cactus, Karkat? I promise I’ll water it every day.”

“You don’t water cacti every day, they’re desert plants.”

“I promise I’ll feed it,” he continues, as if you hadn't said a word.

“That’s even further from what you do with cacti.”

“I’ll take it on a walk every day so it gets plenty of exercise. And let it sleep in my bed. I will nurture the shit out of this cactus, Karkat.”

“Why don’t you shove it up your ass, Dave?”

“Kinky, but I’m afraid that’s just not what you do with cactuses, Karkat.”

“Cacti,” you correct with a roll of your eyes, steering the cart around Dave. 

“Wait, I want to ride.”

“You can’t ride, we’re about to fill this thing up with food.”

“Let me ride until we get there.”

“Dave Strider, you are twenty-two years old,” you remind your boyfriend as he climbs into the cart. He has to fold his knees up, but the glee on his face is incomparable. With exaggerated effort (though it is harder to steer, because he IS twenty-two and he weighs more than you do), you steer the cart containing your boyfriend through the store. You pause at electronics to rifle through the 5 dollar movie bin, and Dave somehow manages to latch his gangly limbs onto the boxed candy bin and drags the entire cart over so he can rummage through it.

“Karkat, can I get a candy?”

“Dave, I was under the impression that I had taken my adult boyfriend shopping with me, not a two-year-old child.”

Dave sticks his tongue out at you and selects his candy, putting two boxes of Sour Patch Kids in the cart. You find an old Bill Murray movie in the 5 dollar bin and toss it at Dave, who catches it, of course. Then you grab hold of the cart once more and finally make your way into the actual grocery department. Two loaves of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and a jar of Nutella find their way into your cart in short order. 

Dave takes about twelve selfies, angling you into the background, and sends them to all of his snapchat contacts. 

You argue with Dave for about five minutes in the chip aisle, trying to convince him that he does not need to buy five bags of Doritos at once, and scare away three teenagers and an employee in the process. Dave ends up putting four bags of Doritos in the cart and you’re too old for this: you are twenty-three years old and already an old man. Dave Strider will be the death of you.

By the time you reach the dairy aisle at the very back of the store, Dave has climbed out of the cart, claiming his Doritos needed room to breathe. You tell him to grab a gallon of milk, and then send him to put it back when he returns with chocolate. When you get the milk yourself, pulling a gallon of 2% from the cooler and placing it in the cart, Dave complains that you’re being “racist”, and you tell him that it’s racist to even call the milk racist. He goes on a tangent that you only half pay attention to in favor of collecting a tub of strawberry yogurt, a package of string cheese, and a block of mild cheddar.

In the frozen meat aisle, you grab a bag of hamburger patties and a bag of chicken tenderloins as Dave snags some dinosaur chicken nuggets with the most shit-eating grin you’ve ever seen on someone who wasn’t literally five years old. You can’t fault him though; dinosaur chicken nuggets just taste better than other varieties of nugs.

Dave takes your place as cart-pusher as you examine your list and collect the items you need, leaning his elbows against the frame of the metal cart and shuffling along leisurely. While you look for stir-fry, you tell him to pick out a couple of frozen pizzas from the cooler behind you.

“What kind should we get?”

“What kind do you want?”

“I dunno. What brand do you usually buy? Is it this blue one?”

“DiGiorno.”

“Goddamn, are you serious? Are you shitting me, Karkat? I’ve been eating DiGiorno all this time? I can’t believe it’s not delivery.”

“Wrong brand slogan, Dave. If you’re going to suspend your disbelief, do it right.”

“What about this one?” Dave asks, opening a cooler. “Sam’s Choice. Who the hell is Sam?”

“Sam Walton, founder of Walmart,” you reply absently.

“It says it has a naturally rising crust. Naturally rising. No goddamned artificial leavening for this bitch. Why would they even advertise that? I can name loads of things that rise naturally and they don’t get advertised. People just fucking know that these things rise all on their own. For example, the fucking sun rises naturally. Similarly, the moon. That sucker loves to rise even if it ain’t dark yet. And hey, you know what else rises naturally, Karkat? My dick. My dick is a natural born riser. All it needs is a view of your hella fine ass and bam, that fucker’s at attention.”

“Dave, you useless paperclip, not in public.”

“There’s no one here,” Dave replies.

“I’m here,” an employee calls from the end of the aisle, looking more amused than disconcerted.

“She’s here, Dave,” you repeat pointedly.

“Yes. Yes, she is. My apologies, miss, uh,"

"Nepeta," the employee supplies helpfully.

"Miss Nepeta. But I’ve just spent the last three years of my life in this Walmart, and I want to make sure my boyfriend here remembers exactly how Dave Jr. and I feel about him and his choice ass.”

“We’ve been here like an hour, Dave, stop exaggerating.”

The employee stifles a giggle and nods. “It’s fine. I’ll just be over here if you need anything.”

“Good job, dickwaffle, you scared her away from her job. Just pick a goddamned pizza.”

“So do you want the dick pizza or nah?”

“I’ll give you one guess.”

“DiGiorno it is,” Dave says, dropping a few pepperoni pizzas in the cart. He adds a bag of pizza rolls to the cart, as well as a box of frozen waffles from the next aisle over. You begin to head for the canned goods to round out your purchase with something societally viewed as relatively healthy.

“Peas, Karkat? Oh my god, are you dying?”

“Shut up, you flaccid pancake,” you snap back.

“That’s two breakfast food names in a row. You hungry babe?”

“Maybe a little.”

Dave wraps his arms around you from behind and presses a kiss to the top of your head. 

“All right,” you say, letting him cuddle you right in the middle of aisle 7. “So, no peas? How about green beans?”

“Better.”

You toss some canned veggies haphazardously into the cart, as well as some soup for good measure. Dave retrieves a box of instant rice and a case of ramen from the next aisle over. The two of you deliberate over fresh produce for a while before just dropping a bag of apples and some grapes into your cart and moving on.

You lose Dave for a few minutes as he darts into the clothing section. You find him just in time to talk him out of buying a pair of jeggings from the ladies section. He whines at you for a couple of minutes but eventually follows you toward the registers.

There are two registers open at Walmart during the hour at which you and Dave prepare to make your purchase, and you gravitate your cart toward the one with an actual conveyor belt since you have a ton of shit in your cart and you were a cashier up until last year, so there’s no way you’re going to be that cruel to the poor guy at the smoke shop. The two cashiers are standing near the shorter register, so when you push your cart up, the cashier at the register you’ve chosen smiles at you as she makes her way around the bag carousel and back to her station. “Hey there. How are you two doing tonight?”

“Fine, thanks,” you say, trying to sort your items as you put them out to make her job easier. Dave unhelpfully starts piling things on the conveyer belt, so you just rearrange them as best you can. “How about you?”

“Can’t complain,” she says, sounding relatively chipper.

“Can’t, or aren’t allowed?” Dave asks.

The cashier taps the side of her nose and points toward Dave with a wink. He grins lazily and abandons helping you, choosing instead to lean against the little bar people write checks on. “Is there a difference?”

“I’d say not really, Aradia,” Dave says, and your head snaps up to double-check if you recognize her before you notice the nametag clipped to her vest. “Though your job must suck some serious ass. Especially the night shift. Do you get bored?”

“Very,” Aradia replies, still smiling. By this time, the cashier from the facing register has come toward you and is making a grabby motion toward Aradia. She hands him a hand-held scanner and he stoops to scan the ramen and case of soda beneath the basket of your cart. “Thanks, Gamzee.”

“No mothertruckin’ problem, sis,” the other cashier says, leaning against his register lazily. 

Dave winks at you as you toss the condoms on the register. You roll your eyes. Aradia giggles at the two of you. “Your boyfriend is cute,” Aradia tells Dave, her tone conspiratorial. 

“I know right?” Dave agrees with all the enthusiasm of a teenaged girl talking about her favorite fictional character. He grabs you by the waist and kisses you suddenly. You push him away gently so you can finish unloading the cart.

“Save it, Dave,” you grumble.

“Oh I’m saving it,” Dave replies with a teasing lilt to his voice.

Aradia spins the bag carousel and you tell Dave to start putting the packed bags into the cart. “So why are y’all out shopping so late? Avoiding the crowds?”

“Karkat doesn’t trust me to go shopping by myself,” Dave replies quickly.

“Last time I sent him grocery shopping, he came home with twelve bottles of apple juice and a loaf of bread,” you tell the girl.

“They were on SALE.”

“That doesn’t mean you need to buy all of them, you complete abacus.”

“I disagree.”

Aradia giggles again and turns the bag carousel.

Dave carefully puts the bags containing his Doritos in the upper part of the cart where a child would sit. “Don’t crush my babies, Karkat.”

“Do you want your waffles in a bag?” Aradia asks.

“Nah, it’s cool,” Dave replies, taking the box from the cashier and sticking it right in the cart.

“All right. So your total tonight is 184.13.”

“I got a hundred,” Dave says, fishing out his wallet. He hands Aradia a 100 dollar bill. “And four. Oh hey, and thirteen. Nice.”

“Can we do the rest on my card?”

Aradia hums in affirmation, tapping on her screen. “So one-oh-four thirteen in cash, and eighty dollars on your card.” She folds the receipt up neatly and hands it to you. “Here’s your receipt!”

“Have a good night, Aradia,” Dave says. “Hope the rest goes by quick.”

“You two certainly helped,” she says, grinning brightly. “Have a great night!”

You scrub at your eyes as you and Dave head for your car. You’re starting to notice just how tired you are, and you’re pretty sure Dave’s caught on, too, because he gently snags the keys from your hand and returns the cart to the outdoor corral. You find your way into the car and are fitting the belt into the buckle when Dave returns, slides easily into the car, and kisses your forehead. “You wanna make some popcorn and finish that movie, babe?”

You nuzzle into his shoulder. “That sounds really great, actually.”

So Dave drives you home. It takes two trips to get all the groceries up the three flights of stairs to your apartment. Dave makes the popcorn while you stuff all the perishables into either the fridge or the freezer, and then the two of you adjourn to the sofa where you fit together, lazy and comfortable and perfect, and resume the movie. You don’t remember the movie ending, but you do sort of notice when Dave scoops you up off the couch and awkwardly carries you to the bedroom. He helps you under the covers and holds you close, nuzzling his face into your hair as you easily drift to sleep.


End file.
